Do you think in our efforts to have equality that women are now to masculine?

I specialise in Women's Health and Wellness and have written several books on women's hormones. I have found in my clinic and the larger community that working women have high levels of testosterone. This is a "male"hormone found in both sexes but seems to be much higher than it should be in working women.
I believe the causes are:
* social (women need to be man-like in thoughts to work)
* Foods such as carbs may push levels up
* Stress (adrenal glands made testosterone in women and also stress hormones
* Survival (testosterone can be activated when a person fears for their life)

Sep 17 2012:
Really?
Then, if they had stayed home instead, they would have been more feminine, right?
I don't want to twist what you're saying, though.
Unlike the way my grandma's generation lived, it's true that these days women are open to more chances and job opportunities.
So it's also true that we're under a lot of pressure from work.
Then, would it be unnatural for women's health to be active like this?

Sep 17 2012:
I would say women are women and to a great extent that really matters about as much as the fact that I have SNP rs1447295. If you say all woman are to masculine you are asking for an argument on the proper place of a woman. I do not see work as man-like woman work and have always worked. Diet would be an interesting study, but food is not masculine. My view is equality is not something you would or should trade for a slightly lower hormone level even if that were scientifically proven.

Sep 18 2012:
I would say perhaps, to an extent. But at the same time I would say that, at least in the US, much of the political and social efforts to establish gender equality have largely emasculated men. Socially by way of often reactionary attitudes taking a position that masculinity itself is anti-social or socially unacceptable, and politically through the establishment of the family court system, which has statistically shown a gender bias towards women in everything from custody cases to allegations of abuse or misconduct.

Sep 18 2012:
I would actually go the other way... and suggest we've made men more feminine... It's kind of embarassing to see all these guys in their physical prime smiling at customer service jobs, rather than doing productive labor... Maybe biology is reacting to that.

Testosterone also boosts sex drive... So maybe it's just a consequence of working women being more likely to be single. Testosterone goes up to get them out on the prowl.

Sep 17 2012:
I know when I put a dress on instead of a business suit I start to feel more feminine straight away. With jeans and pants so much wore nowadays we have masculined the way we dress. What is wrong with wearing a dress to feel more feminine

Sep 17 2012:
Work requires energy, skill and focus; effective working has nothing to do with gender.
But if working women have higher testosterone it could be due to the factors that you've stated.

It is true that some feminists believe that women are only emancipated when they are like men; but like Robert Mayer has stated, women are women, and they should aim to at nothing but excellence in the workplace.

Sep 17 2012:
Surely masculine is the generalized behaviour and condition of all men, and feminine the generalized behaviour and condition of all women. Therefore, if women change, what it is to be feminine changes. But let's leave that aside

'Should' implies there is a correct level of testosterone in women. Could you tell us what this is, how it was decided, and if there are side-effects from having a testosterone level which deviates from this. Also, are you saying that levels of testosterone in women have been increasing over time, or are you saying simply that different experiences and exposures can (partly) account for the testosterone variation within a stable profile.

I'm afraid my experience in this area extends only as far as dog-whelk psudopenises (pun not intended), but it sounds interesting.

Sep 17 2012:
I believe that you overrate testosterone a bit. Look, males do have in average higher testosterone than woman, but, it does not make them all the same "masculine". You gonna find very much simmiliar testosterone levels in a group of tested males, but you gonna find the full range from Sissy to Rambo in your tested group.

Also, woman always worked, only a few of them who married rich or who were born in privileged families did not. The so called "housewife" just existed a short time in western world, when taking care of the home ment to push some buttons on machines and sort stuff in and out. Before that was a fulltime workday. And, this wonderland lasted only a few decades, maybe two or three generations, then the loans dropped and woman had to work again, cause one income was not enough for a family.

Work will not be the source of increasing testosterone levels in woman, as this is no new sensation to them.

Sep 18 2012:
We get more work accomplished per person worldwide however... So... Why did we let them make it so that "one income was not enough for a family." again? How was that not a huge evolutionairy step back for all of humanity, that we started accomplishing more, but accepting lower pay?

Sep 17 2012:
What is your definition of working women ?
What about singers, models, actresses ....do they also have higher testosterone level?
Did you check testosterone level on women working in village in farms.....say in Africa, Asia .......where women are actively involved in farming while also have to perform household work?

Sep 17 2012:
Women, all over the world & throughout the ages, have always worked hard. They don't need to think like a man, but in certain cases do because of the type of work. If your working hard, no matter the job, you will need carbs. Women show their stress more then men- they let it out instead of holding it in. Survival: Women deal with it on various levels every day.
My question to you is: Should testosterone be labeled strictly a male hormone?
Seems to me that it has been needed all along in women, throughout their history.
Are women becoming more masculine? No!

Sep 17 2012:
There have been many changes in women's health since they joined the workforce in equal numbers. But as a woman who began her career by looking through the "girl wanted" ads, and then the "female wanted", and who none-the-less made significant advances in her career, it was because I had to adapt to and mimic the men's world that I was living in. It wasn't pretty. It wasn't healthy. It wasn't fun.